Dear Mike / BBC Radio Manchester team
I’m writing to offer an interview with novelist Mo Fanning, whose new book Lisa Doyle is Absolutely Fine publishes on 18 June. It’s a comedy set in a Manchester theatre – a woman announces a fake engagement on Instagram after too much wine and spends six months trying to keep the story straight while managing the box office and her terrifying boss’s wife.
Mo is a Midlands-based author (and former Manchester resident) with five novels to his name and bylines in The Bookseller, BookBrunch and writing.ie. He’s written the lead comment article for The Bookseller LGBTQ+ June Edition, and is an official speaker at the Queer the Shelves festival in Nottingham on 27 June.
There’s a nice local angle: the book is genuinely rooted in Manchester – the theatre, the social dynamics, the voice. It launched during a week when romance fiction is having a major moment: the British Book Awards just introduced a Romantic Fiction category for the first time, and UK romance sales hit a record £69 million last year.
Mo is an engaging, funny interviewee – happy to come into MediaCityUK at any time that works for the show, or to do it by phone/Zoom. He can talk about the book, the Manchester setting, the fake-engagement premise, or the broader romance boom and what it means for indie authors.
I can send a press PDF, proof copy or audio immediately. Happy to work around your schedule.
Best,
Adrian Bedford
ABC Book Marketing
Tel: 07881 925376